Blast in Pakistan Kills Seven Despite Ban on Mobile Services

Pakistan has banned mobile phone and wireless services over the weekend

Soldiers from Pakistan's paramilitary Rangers forces patrol on a road ahead of Ashura in Lahore. Reuters

At least seven people have been killed and five injured in the Dera Ismail Khan district of north-west Pakistan, during a morning Shia Muslim procession on Saturday 24 November.

"The bomb was planted in a dustbin, the blast was powerful and heard several kilometres away," AFP reported, quoting police officers.

The blast occurred even after mobile phone and wireless services in major cities were suspended to prevent sectarian violence during Ashura, a period of Shia Muslim commemorations.

The number of attacks on Shia processions has increased recently and authorities believe that 90 percent of the blasts were carried out using mobile phones. Mobile phone services were temporarily suspended in parts of Islamabad- the capital city of Pakistan, Karachi and in Quetta.

"More than 90 percent of bomb blasts have been carried out through mobile SIMs," said Pakistan's Interior Minister Rehman Malik earlier.

"Most recently, all the blasts that occurred in the last 15 days were mobile phone-based".

In some areas, motorcycles carrying passengers were also banned to prevent attackers from gaining access to their targets.

Dozens of people have already been killed in Pakistan in the past week, though Pakistani authorities have arranged aerial surveillance and have deployed thousands of extra police personnel to monitor the processions.

As many as 36 people were killed in the two deadliest attacks, which targeted Shia Muslims in the city of Rawalpindi in Punjab province and Karachi on 21 November.